What and Where to Eat in Taipei

As you know Taipei is known for its amazing street food and there are abundance of it everywhere you go. From beef noodle soup, stinky tofu, deep fried chicken, Taiwanese Sausages, pineapple cakes and more.

Taipei like most larger Asian city, it never sleeps. Whether it is 2am or 2pm you can always find something delicious to snack on.

This short guide will hopefully get the most out of your visit to Taipei. For a more indepth review of each of these places, please click on their corresponding links.

Taipei is the enormous diversity of food that offers to all of us hungry, curious diners that are always eager to try new yummy treats. However, we know that sometimes it’s a bit hard for non-Chinese speakers to get to know the local delicacies and the best places to have them. Here is a short list with some of the tastiest local preparations. We have covered it all: breakfast, lunch, dinner dessert and the most typical late-afternoon snack.

Shilin Night Market

Shilin Night Market is the largest night market in Taipei offering an array of local Taiwanese cuisine ranging from fried chicken to baked beef buns to stinky tofu to oyster omlette and bitter melon to general merchandise.

Location: 70 meters from Jiantan MRT.

Shida Night Market

Shida Night Market – is the second largest night market in Taipei also offering an array of local Taiwanese cuisine ranging from bubble teas to Gua Bao’s (Taiwanese Burgers), Grilled meats to general merchandise.

Location: MRT Station Taipower Building, Exit 3

Roast Goose

Ya Rou Bianis one of the delicacies in Taiwan and only a handful of stores still serve this. Serving only roast goose where you can specify the amount you want according to price.

Ay-Chung sells only one thing, which is rice flour noodles which is more commonly known as rice vermicelli in a thick, rich starchy broth, with traces of pork meat, and pig’s stomach, and intestines. Great snack food to fill your stomach

Address: No.8-1, Emei St., Wanhua District, Taipei City

Ding Tai Fung

Dumplings at Ding Tai Fung are a must visit and eat. World famous for their dumplings specifically their Xiao Long Bao’s that are filled with mince pork and a broth that flows into your mouth when you bite into it are to die for. There are a number of outlets throughout Taipei, be sure to make a visit and try their Xiao Long baos.

Noodles do vary from shop to shop which can be your normal machine cut noodles to various forms of hand cut noodles.

Breeze Centre– located next to the Taipei Main Station offering a large number cuisines, you will find a section focusing on Beef Noodle soup where each store has won a number of awards. This is a great place to give a few different beef noodle soups a try without having to trek across Taipei to try different beef noodle soups.

Taoyuan Beef Noodle – noodles made to order, however you notice that they are constantly cooking noodles to cater for the demand of patrons who come in, order, eat and then leave, meaning the turn around time is fairly quick.

Location: No.15 Taoyuan Street, Zhongzheng District, Taipei, Taiwan

Shang Dou Noodles – knife cut noodles with various fillings that you can choose from. Noodles are cooked to order.

Bubble teas have expanded in popularity in the last few years, where you can find them around the globe. Bubble tea originated from Taiwan and you will be able to spot many stalls selling bubble tea, whether it is in the city, shopping mall or night markets. You would not need to travel to far to get a bubble tea

Pineapple Cakes

Pineapple Cakes is another well known Taiwanese export is the pineapple cake, sweet thick pineapple filling encased in a sweet pastry. Each bakery in Taiwan will certainly make their own pineapple cakes, some are nicer than others.

Chia Te– main specialty is the pineapple cake, but is a full fledged bakery also swelling other Taiwanse goodies from egg tarts to wife cakes, Moon cakes, sun cakes, Cakes, sponges etc.

Location: 105 Nanjing East Road, Section 5, No 88, Taipei

Sunny Hills – selling point to Sunny Hills is that no preservatives are used in their pineapple cakes, making them slightly tart than other pineapple cakes.

You may have read about Taiwanese breakfast which involves a lot of dough and deep frying which may not rank high in terms of things to try. I must confess I was in the same situation as, fearing the amount of calories I am going to consume in one sitting. But then thinking agian, we do not get this food back home.

You may already have a go to breakfast place that is conventialy located near your hotel. I do recommend you try either one of the two places below.

Fu Hang Dou Jiang – is a popular eatery which is open in the mornings, where you see both locals and tourists alike snaking their way to the shop front in order to get the popular Taiwanese breakfast items.

Yong He Dou Jiang – Like Fu Hang Dou Jian, Yong He offers salty soy milk , Shao Bing which is a flat bread with You Tiao etc. They offer slightly more items than Fu Hang Dou Jiang, which also includes steam buns, xiao long bao etc. They are open 24 hours so you do not need to get up early to beat the queues. Depending on the time of day you go, there may be queues especially during breakfast.

Also known as scallion/spring onion pancakes, where the texture is similar to a roti, which has bits of spring onion. Taiwanese pancakes are fairly fluffy and soft, as they are fluffed up during the cooking process. These are good cheap belly fillers

A popular stall is the Tianjing Chong Zhua which is located around the corner from Ding Tai Fung in Xinyi, where you will always see a queue of people eating this wonderful street snack.

Location: No.1,6 Alley,Yongkang Street, Taipei, Taiwan

Shaved Ice

Also located on the same street as Tianjin Chong Zhua (Taiwanese pancakes) is Smoothie House serving shaved ice desserts. The original store located on the corner has recently expanded to a more modern shop where it only serves mango shaved ice, while the original sore sells other flavours such as lychee, strawberry etc… Most people seem to opt for mango flavoured shaved ice.. Perhaps its due to the fact that asian mangoes are used (these mangoes tend to be a lot sweeter than the mangoes we get back home which are from Queensland, Australia. Very fretting and cooling especially on a hot day.

Location: No.15 YongKang Street, Da-an District, Taipei

Ice Cream

Snow King has been in existence since 1947 offering over 70 different flavours of ice cream which are all made inhouse. The flavours are very unique for example, beer, yam, tomato, wasabi, pigs feet, pork floss etc.